3 iOS & Android Updates to Consider in Your 2025 Push Notification Strategy

Push notifications are central to helping marketers capture customers’ attention on today’s most valuable and visible real estate: smartphone lock screens. They offer the simplicity, immediacy and relevancy that today’s consumers expect, while enabling brands to continually bring customers back to your app for conversion. 

In 2024, Apple and Google announced key updates that are changing the way that push notifications are displayed and consumed. Marketers need to understand how these updates will impact engagement, and regularly assess performance against industry standards to continue winning over and retaining today’s consumers. Our upcoming report, Mobile App Push Notification Benchmarks for 2025, will offer industry benchmarks for key performance metrics to put your campaigns into context and provide best practices to maximize conversions.

As a pre-read, here are the top 3 iOS and Android updates you need to consider in your 2025 strategy to ensure your push notification content hits the mark.

Apple Intelligence Places Newfound Importance on Push Notification Content Relevance

Apple Intelligence, announced in June 2024, has recently become widely available in the rollout of iOS18. Priority Notifications surface notifications that are deemed most important, while summaries provide users with a quick snapshot of long or stacked notifications directly on the lock screen. The goal is to help consumers sift through a growing number of communications from brands battling for their attention, using personal context and generative summaries.

As adoption increases, the role of Apple’s highlights and summaries will continue to evolve. Already, they have suspended summaries for news and entertainment apps following accuracy concerns. Regardless, brands must keep relevancy as their North Star, focusing on delivering the right content to the right people, or risk getting deprioritized by the algorithms. Personalization and segmentation will play a key role in success. Delivering tailored content to customers that are most likely to engage with it will help you avoid messaging fatigue and land yourself at the top of customers’ lists. 

Mobile App Locks May Limit Push Notification Visibility

In 2024, Apple and Google both introduced new proactive user-focused features limiting visibility and access to apps and notifications. When an iOS app is “locked” or an Android app is deemed a “Private Space,” information from these apps is hidden across notifications and search. The goal of these features is to provide users with more control over what content is displayed on lock screens, so external users don’t inadvertently access private information. 

Marketers may see an impact on push notification direct open rates as a result of these new updates. especially for apps that involve sensitive data like healthcare and finance. It will be more important than ever before to secure opt-ins during the activation lifecycle phase, while embracing a culture of experimentation to optimize content for maximum conversions. Proactively taking these steps will ensure your brand continues to see high engagement regardless of app locking. 

iPhone Mirroring Brings Push Notifications to Macs to Boost Engagement

With the release of macOS Sequoia, Apple introduced iPhone Mirroring — enabling full access to and control of the iPhone directly from macOS. Users can review and respond to iPhone notifications directly from their Mac as they move between channels and devices. Mobile app push notifications will appear alongside web notifications, increasing overall visibility.

iPhone Mirroring offers marketers extended engagement opportunities by reaching customers with app notifications even when they aren’t actively on their phone. As this becomes more commonplace, brands must focus on unifying experiences across app and web, ensuring consistency no matter where the customer chooses to engage. 

Maintain a Competitive Edge with Airship’s Push Notification Benchmarks — Coming Soon!

Push notification consumption is changing and it’s up to brands to stay relevant. Stay tuned for the release of our upcoming Mobile App Push Notification Benchmarks for 2025 — designed to help you see how your campaigns stack up to competitors and showcase success stories from brands unlocking the full power of push. Taking a data-driven approach to campaign ideation and execution will ensure you keep pace with technological shifts now and in the future. 

In the meantime, you can book a meeting with our team of experts to learn how we can help you refine your push strategies for maximum engagement and conversions.